Final cut on youtube
Sunday 30 April 2017
Wednesday 26 April 2017
Evaluation Question 1
1. For our short film this year we decided that we wanted to incorporate
the codes and conventions of a drama film, without fully conforming to them. We
did this through our creation of characters which subvert expectations and a narrative
with a twist at the end. Our film Aftermath follows the character Georgie who
has returned from war and is trying to overcome her PTSD. The plot conformed to
drama conventions as it handles an emotional and relatable issue which is
commonplace in society. On the other hand our film has a sad and unexpected
ending unlike a traditional drama which usually have happy endings. Our film
also borrows aspects from other genres, such as the combat scene is borrowed
from the war genre, and the fact that we have a large twist suggests aspects of
a thriller.
Genre
An important part of what makes a genre is the setting. We were
very aware of this during the planning of our film and this is why we agreed on
the idea of Geordie returning from war and trying to return to her normal life.
This gave us the opportunity to explore the themes of PTSD, loss and anxiety.
All of which are very common within society but are often ignored in the media,
especially PTSD. As PTSD is such an ignored topic we wanted to approach it in a
realistic, respectful, and informative way. Our film does conform to the codes
and conventions of the drama genre for the most part. One way it does this is
the film focuses on the realistic struggles of a single main character. Due to
the flashback at the beginning being set during a time of war our film could be
considered a war-drama hybrid. However we focused more on the drama genre as we
felt that the war part of the film was only a small part as the films main
focus was the mental illness and not the war. Some of the main drama conventions
we conformed to include; realistic characters and settings (Dr Sullivan and the
house), the progression and development of the main character (Georgie’s
realisation of Charlotte being a hallucination), and a characters internal
conflict (Georgie trying to move on).
However our film also subverts the codes and conventions. One
example of this is that drama films often star a couple, which we adhered to, however
we didn’t conform full to this as the couples in drama films are often made up
of a man and a woman whilst in our film the couple is two women. They both also
subvert stereotypes of women as they were in the army which is a typically male
profession. The ending also subverts the conventions of drama as it isn’t happy
as we realise that Georgie is suffering and alone as her girlfriend Charlotte
died in the war.
The use of using people who aren’t there as a personification of
the main characters feelings was inspired by another short film called Growth
by Elliot Gough in which the main character is going through a breakup and
talks to versions of his past self and his ex-girlfriend who aren’t really
there.
Continuity
This year we were more experienced with the concept of continuity,
however we still had our issues. This was mainly because the film was longer so
we had to spend longer filming meaning there was a greater chance of things
changing between shoots.
One of the main continuity issues we had to deal with was
Charlotte’s hair as during shooting Ellie’s hair kept changing. It started off pink,
long and curly, at the next shoot it was less pink, shorter, and straight, it
then went blue and ended the film brown. We managed to counteract this problem
by re-shooting some of the first scenes and in later scenes covering up the hair
with a scarf and a hood.
Another issue we had was house furnishings and lighting. When we
originally filmed there were curtains on the window in the kitchen, however
during a later filming session the curtains had become blinds sadly there was
nothing we could do about this as it was too late in the filming process but if
we had the time we would have re-shot the earlier scenes.
Examples of continuity errors in real life media products include
in the Shawshank Redemption the scattered bullets on the head of the prisons
desk become a neat pile in the next shot. Another example is in Star Wars: The
Empire Strikes Back in one shot Han Solo isn’t wearing a jacket however in the
close up, he is.
Influences
One of the real media product inspirations of our film was Stray
Dog by Bertie Gilbert. We decided that the title sequence within this short
film would allow us to give a greater insight into the characters in a short
amount of time.
We used mise-en-scene, to provide this insight, by showing household
objects such as flowers, an empty chair, and a purse with a photo in it. The
empty chair is shown on the name of the actor who plays Charlotte as it hint’s
that Charlotte isn’t real. The solitary nature and stillness of the items represents
Georgie’s loneliness and the fact that she isn’t moving on. The purse with the
photo shows the relationship between Georgie and Charlotte and shows that they’re
close. We felt that this helped set up the tone of the film whilst also setting
up a connection between the two characters and allowing the audience to
understand what’s going on.
Another real media product I looked at was The Fleeting Little
Life of Peter Wright. This helped to inspire the themes of mental health in our
short film and the twist at the end. The Fleeting Little Life of Peter Wright
is about a person trying to convince her friend to not kill himself, and at the
end of the film some doubt is created about whether she was real or not.
Despite our film making it much clear that Charlotte was dead I liked the idea
of the possibility of the friend not being there and decided to put our groups own
twist on it. We also wanted to explore mental health and this gave us in idea
on how to tie that in to our film whilst also using a small amount of dark
humour to engage our audience such as when Charlotte says “last time we went
out you wouldn’t stop jumping at cars”.
Was our film entertaining?
Richard Dyer’s theory of entertainment states that people consume
media to counteract feelings of loneliness, boredom, absence, inadequacy,
discontentment, social tension and abstinence. The theory is split into five parts;
energy, abundance, community, intensity, and transparency. He believes that
film provides us with all five of these things and that they aid audiences to
feel fulfilled with a film.
Energy
Dyer believes that Energy is important due to the pressures of
modern society such as alienated labour and consistent hard work. Because of
this Dyer believes that the energy in films allows for “escapism” by watching
characters acting out their own desires that they are not able to fulfil. He
believes films inspire audiences to increase their energy levels through
characters showing their power, passion and physical activity.
An example of
this is Captain America (2011). This shows a skinny boy with a plethora of
medical conditions becoming a hero and fighting against an evil regime and
winning. Our film does this through fast paced editing in the flashback representing
the dangers being faced and urgency of the matter, this is paired with music
that builds tension to reflect the tenseness of the situation. We also allow
the audience to connect with the main characters path to recovery through the
use of close ups and point of view shots.
Abundance
Abundance is in reference to the want of material belongings and
having enough to spare. Many people who watch films don’t have this luxury and
therefore watch films to get a taste of it and fill the void.
An example of
this would be The Social Network. In The Social Network Jessie Eisenberg’s character creates a
social media page for the university he is in which ends up going worldwide and
he becomes rich. Jessie Eisenberg’s character is relatable as he is a reject
among his peers which is something many people have experiences. Because of
this the audience can use the character as a voyeur and imagine themselves in
his shoes. Our film does this in a quite twisted kind of way by showing
Georgie as an everyday relatable person, but instead of allowing the audience to
feel luxury we allow them to feel what living with PTSD is like. As it isn’t
often talked about this allows non-suffers to learn about the illness and to
appreciate the fact they don’t have it. It also allows sufferers to relate to
the main character and feel comfort in the fact they aren’t alone.
Community
Community brings audiences together through the films they watch creating
a sense of togetherness by encouraging discussion. Community can also comfort
individuals without active social lives or who have busy schedules and are
unable to relax. In our film we showed
the sense of community through the therapist that supports Georgie through the
recovery process. This also shows an audience that asking for help is okay. Charlotte’s
existence also indicates that mental illness can take over and become a very
powerful force within someone’s brain.
An example of this in real media
products would be Shutter Island (2010) in which we see Leonardo Dicaprio’s
character create a whole alternate reality to avoid the pain of losing his wife
and children before revealing at the end of the film it was all in his head.
Intensity
Wanting excitement is in human nature. Intensity creates this excitement
that can’t be found in day to day life. People consume media full of thrills and
adventure so that they can get an adrenaline rush they wouldn’t be able to
usually get by watching situations they could never find themselves in.
An example
of this would be Guardians of the Galaxy (2014) which follows Peter Quill a
lovable space rogue working together with a bunch of aliens to save the galaxy.
The film is full of cgi, action and music which draws people in. Obviously the
events of this film couldn’t happen as they are entirely fictional and
impossible. Our film achieves this through
the existence of Charlotte as she is a hallucination caused by grief and would
not have a physical manifestation, because of this the audience would not be
able to see Charlotte in real life. Intensity is also brought into our film
through the flashback, as they provide action with hints of violence and the
chaos of war, something most people haven’t experienced.
Transparency
Transparency is the act of being honest
and effectively communicating with others to oppose the manipulation
individuals experience through advertising and politics. Georgie constantly
denies her PTSD until the end of the film causing the relationship between
Charlotte and Georgie to be frayed. Charlotte’s presence is there to explain to
the audience what is happening to Georgie, and to portray PTSD in a manner that
is easy to understand to an unaware audience. We used Charlotte’s presence to
avoid confusion within the audience so they wouldn’t just be witnessing Georgie
talking to herself without an explanation whilst also showing PTSD from the
point of view from the sufferer. We aimed to help explain away the stigma surrounding
mental health by attaching the illness to a “strong” character one wouldn’t expect
to suffer, showing that anyone can be affected. To ensure we were sensitive with
the topic we researched heavily into the topic and detailed this on the blog.
Evaluation Question 3
Original Brief
We began the process by each creating multiple story-lines
that we shared with the group. We discussed what we liked about each story-line
before trying to incorporate ideas from each person into one idea. We all
agreed on the idea of showing the struggle of a female soldier suffering with
post-traumatic stress disorder. We also decided that the characters girlfriend
should have also died in the war but appears to the main character as the
personification of the PTSD. This original ideas stayed the same for the most
part throughout the process but was changed based on feedback as we went along.
Video Questionnaire
We created a video questionnaire to gather opinions on our
original idea and got five people to answer it. We started the questionnaire by
asking questions about them to get more of a picture of who is answering the
questions in comparison to our target audience.
Most of the people we asked were between the ages of 15 and
17 and most were male. We also asked what types of films they usually watch to
get an idea of what we could do to appeal to this audience. We found that the
most popular genre was comedy closely followed by action, with drama coming
third. This was a good sign as we wanted to create a war based drama, however
comedy coming first made us decide to put hints of dark humour throughout the
film.
We also asked were people preferred to watch films, it became clear that even though online wasn’t the most popular it was the most accessible so we decided to go ahead with plans to distribute via YouTube.
We then read out the plot to our film and asked them
questions based on this. We asked what genre they thought our film would be and
the majority said drama or war drama meaning that we had managed to meet our
preferred genre and that we would appeal to fans of those genres. We asked
questions about what settings would be expected in the film and we were
suggested home and therapy which we listened to and went on to include in our
film. We also asked about what music would be expected in our film. The main
answer was dramatic music followed by sad music as those are common in the
drama genre, we believed this would fit into our film well so kept that in mind
when selecting music.Linking back to where people like to watch films we asked
where they would expect to see our film, most said the cinema but streaming
services such as YouTube were also mentioned meaning that our path of
distribution could work. The next question was what certificate should our film have,
4 out of the 5 people suggested 15 due to the dark themes and hints of war,
which we agreed with and so set this as our certificate age.
All of the people taking the questionnaire said that they
found our story-line interesting and intriguing and they also said they liked
the title “Aftermath”. Because of this we decided to keep our story-line mostly
the same and to keep the title. When we asked for anything that could improve
the film the only comment we got was “good musical cues” so again we made sure
to focus on music during the process to help make the film have an emotional
impact.
Rough Cut Questionnaire
To create our Rough Cut questionnaire we used Google Forms
as we could get more responses in a shorter amount of time than the video
questionnaire as this could be shared online. We got respondents to watch the
rough cut of our film. We did this so that we could make the necessary changes
to our film before the final cut to make sure that it made sense and was
enjoyable. This also allowed us to get a fresh pair of eyes on the film that
didn’t know any background information, as we all knew the plot so everything
made sense to us and this caused some tunnel vision. This questionnaire made us realise that some of the
things we tried to put into the film weren’t coming across as well as we had
hoped. For instance we had tried to hint at Charlotte’s death by showing a gun
to her head just before the gunshot, and the fact she moves from room to room
instantly. However this didn’t seem to be as effective as we thought as one of
the comments said that “the ending was too sudden and we should subtly hint it
beforehand”. To counteract this we made another scene in the house to highlight
the apparent teleportation of Charlotte. Another thing was we put a sound that
was supposed to reflect the ringing in Georgies ears after the gunshot however
this was said to be distracting so we removed it as it wasn’t necessary to our
film.
We
received 8 responses on this questionnaire. This time the majority of
respondents were female, allowing us to see another perspective than the video
questionnaire, the respondents were also older as 75% were in between 18 and 20
and 25% were 15-17 meaning that all respondents were within our target
audience.
Our
first question about the film was about the enjoyment of the film on a scale of
1 to 10 (ten being the best answer) the majority said 8/10 and all answers were
between 6 and 9 indicating that no-one disliked the film, which was a good sign
and gave us the motivation to continue and finish the film.
All but one person said they understood the film which made us realise that even though most people got it, we might have to make some things a little more explicit.
The feedback indicated that the music we used worked well with the film however there wasn’t enough of it, because of this we added more music that was similar to the first track we had added to help deliver the emotional impact we wanted. We were also advised that the ticking clock in the therapy scene took made the actors hard to hear, this was harder to remedy as the clock was in the room we filmed in so we couldn’t just remove the sound. However we needed to fix it as this was an emotional scene, because of this (and another bit of feedback that stated the room looked too big) we decided to re-shoot this scene in a different room without a clock. Overall we were much happier with the re-shot scene and felt that it worked better than the old scene, especially as we added more close up based on another piece of feedback saying that the camera was too far away to fell connected to the characters. We were also told that the film had too much walking in it and that this as boring, because of this we edited out a substantial chunk of the walking and shot a new scene that explained the letterbox moment as many people said that they didn’t understand the moment.
All but one person said they understood the film which made us realise that even though most people got it, we might have to make some things a little more explicit.
The feedback indicated that the music we used worked well with the film however there wasn’t enough of it, because of this we added more music that was similar to the first track we had added to help deliver the emotional impact we wanted. We were also advised that the ticking clock in the therapy scene took made the actors hard to hear, this was harder to remedy as the clock was in the room we filmed in so we couldn’t just remove the sound. However we needed to fix it as this was an emotional scene, because of this (and another bit of feedback that stated the room looked too big) we decided to re-shoot this scene in a different room without a clock. Overall we were much happier with the re-shot scene and felt that it worked better than the old scene, especially as we added more close up based on another piece of feedback saying that the camera was too far away to fell connected to the characters. We were also told that the film had too much walking in it and that this as boring, because of this we edited out a substantial chunk of the walking and shot a new scene that explained the letterbox moment as many people said that they didn’t understand the moment.
Final Questionnaire
For
our final questionnaire we used Google Forms again for the same reasons stated
above. After making the changes based on the rough cut questionnaire, we put
the final cut onto a questionnaire and shared it on social media. At this point
we had also added the new scenes, the new music, and the title sequences all of
which we hadn't yet received feedback on. Even though we were happy with the
film this made us nervous as so much had changed since the last questionnaire
that we weren’t sure what the response would be. We decided that the opening
titles should give an incite into the characters personal lives and place it
just after Georgie opens her eyes to make it seem that she has been awake for a
long time before the alarm rings, and we weren’t sure how this would translate
to an audience. However luckily the audience feedback was overwhelmingly
positively.
The
questionnaire was answered by 5 people in our target audience, mostly female
but with some males still, between the ages of 15 and 20. This indicated that
we had succeeding in attracting both female and male audiences, however the
fact that there were more females could be due to the fact that the cast was
fully female and therefore it might attract more females than males. The
questions were similar to the rough cut so that we could actively see the
changes between the two cuts.
The first question again was about their enjoyment of the film on a scale of 1 to 10. This time round the answers were much more concentrated, being split between 8 and 9, suggesting that the changes we made payed off and made the film more enjoyable, this was also reflected in the fact that 100% of people said they understood the film showing that the new scenes cleared up any previous confusion. We asked what certificate they would give the film and the majority said 15 which matches the certificate we gave it meaning that we showed our understanding of the certificate system and how it applied to our film, however two people said that it could be given a 12A which is understandable as there is no explicit violence in our film but the inclusion of swearing does raise the certificate. We then asked where they would expect to see our film and the majority said YouTube again showing that our intentions for distributing on YouTube were realistic, however Cinema and TV were also answered showing that the film could be displayed to a wider audience. When asked what genre they believed the film to be 80% said drama whilst 20% said action, this coincides with our intentions of creating a War-Drama as it includes conventions from the action genre whilst mainly using conventions from the drama genre. When asked about if the music fitted the film 100% of people said that it did and some comments included that the “melancholy tone of the music fit the tone of the film” and that the music “built tension at the appropriate points”.
The final question was what they found successful in the film and what could be improved. Thankfully the suggestions for improvement were limited to audio issues that could have only been fixed by giving the actors microphones which we did not have access to and therefore was out of our control. Things that people found successful included the opening credits, the performances, the narrative being well displayed, and the style being consistent throughout. This shows that the final cut of the film was much more successful than the rough cut as the rough cut questionnaire had many more suggestions for improvement.
The first question again was about their enjoyment of the film on a scale of 1 to 10. This time round the answers were much more concentrated, being split between 8 and 9, suggesting that the changes we made payed off and made the film more enjoyable, this was also reflected in the fact that 100% of people said they understood the film showing that the new scenes cleared up any previous confusion. We asked what certificate they would give the film and the majority said 15 which matches the certificate we gave it meaning that we showed our understanding of the certificate system and how it applied to our film, however two people said that it could be given a 12A which is understandable as there is no explicit violence in our film but the inclusion of swearing does raise the certificate. We then asked where they would expect to see our film and the majority said YouTube again showing that our intentions for distributing on YouTube were realistic, however Cinema and TV were also answered showing that the film could be displayed to a wider audience. When asked what genre they believed the film to be 80% said drama whilst 20% said action, this coincides with our intentions of creating a War-Drama as it includes conventions from the action genre whilst mainly using conventions from the drama genre. When asked about if the music fitted the film 100% of people said that it did and some comments included that the “melancholy tone of the music fit the tone of the film” and that the music “built tension at the appropriate points”.
The final question was what they found successful in the film and what could be improved. Thankfully the suggestions for improvement were limited to audio issues that could have only been fixed by giving the actors microphones which we did not have access to and therefore was out of our control. Things that people found successful included the opening credits, the performances, the narrative being well displayed, and the style being consistent throughout. This shows that the final cut of the film was much more successful than the rough cut as the rough cut questionnaire had many more suggestions for improvement.
Overall
I think that the audience feedback helped shape our film and helped it to
become a success, as we listened to the comments and acted on them to improve.
I feel that we asked a range of questions that helped us to understand the
audience and would definitely use audience feedback to improve future projects.
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